Daisy in the Field Part 33

"Mrs. Randolph has almost signified to me that her favour will depend on my taking such a course, and doing all I can to help on the Confederacy."

"Yes, I know," I said rather sadly; "mamma feels very strongly about it."

"You do not?"

"Yes, Mr. Marshall, I do; but it is in a different way."

"I wish you would explain," he said earnestly.

"But I do not like to set myself in opposition to mamma; and you ought to do what you yourself think right, Mr. Marshall; not what either of us thinks."

"What do _you_ think is right?" he repeated eagerly.

"My thoughts do not make or unmake anything."

"They make - they will make, if you will let them - the rule of my life," he answered. "I have no dearer wish."

I was struck with dismay.

"Please do not say that!" I said trembling. "My thoughts should rule only my own life; not anybody, else's."

"One more!" said Hugh Marshall. "They must rule one more.

There will be one, somewhere, whose highest pleasure will be to please you, as long as he has a life to give to it. - Will you take mine?" he said after a pause and in a lower tone. "I offer it to you undividedly."

It cannot be told, the sickness of heart which came over me.

The mistake I had made in my blindness, the sorrowfulness of it, the pain I must give, the mischief it might do, I saw it all at once. For a while, I could not find words to speak.

Hugh studied my face, and must have seen no ground of hope there, for he did not speak either. He was quite silent and left it to me. Oh, Lake of Annecy! what pain comes to me now with the remembrance of your sweet waters.

I turned at last and laid my hand upon Hugh's arm. He did not mistake me; he took my hand in his, and stood looking at me with a face as grave as my own.

"What is the matter, Daisy?" he said sorrowfully.

"I have made a miserable mistake!" I said. "Cannot we be friends, Mr. Marshall? - dear friends, and nothing more?"

"Why 'nothing more'?"

"I can be no more to you," I answered.

"Why not?"

"I have not the feeling. I have not the power. I would, if I could."

"It is I who have made a mistake," he said, as he dropped my hand.

"No, it is I," I said bitterly. "I have been childishly wrong.

I have been foolish. It never entered my thought, that you - or anybody - liked me, except as a friend."

"And he got your heart without your knowing it?"

"Who?" said I, frightened.

"De Saussure, of course."

"De Saussure! No indeed. I would a thousand times rather give it to you, Hugh. But, I cannot."

"Then it will come," said he, taking my hand again; "if you can say that, it will come. I will wait."

"No, it will not come," I said, as we looked one another in the face. "I can be only a friend. May I not be that?"

He eyed me keenly, I saw, and my eyes for a moment fell. He let go my hand again.

"Then, I understand," - he said. "Shall we go? I believe it is time."

"Where is mamma?" I asked, looking about in some bewilderment now.

"Mrs. Randolph and the rest have gone on; they are some distance ahead of us by this time."

And what were they all thinking too, by this time! In great dismay I turned to go after them with my unwelcome companion.

We walked in silence; I blaming myself greatly for stupidness and blindness and selfish preoccupation, which had made me look at n.o.body's affairs but my own; and grieving sadly too for the mischief I had done.

"Mayn't we be friends, Mr. Marshall?" I said somewhat timidly at last; for I could not bear the silence.

"I can never be anything else," he said. "You may always command me. But I have not misunderstood you, Daisy? You meant to tell me that - _some one_ has been more fortunate than I, and been beforehand with me ?"

"I did not mean to tell you that," I said in a good deal of confusion.

"But it is true ?" he said, looking searchingly at me.

"n.o.body knows it, Hugh," I said. "Not my mother nor my father."

The silence fell again and again became painful. The others of our party were well in advance. - We caught no glimpse of them yet.

"We will be friends, Mr. Marshall?" - I said anxiously.

"Yes, we will be friends, Daisy; but I cannot be a friend near you. I cannot see you any longer. I shall be a wreck now, I suppose. You might have made me - anything !"

"You will make yourself a n.o.ble name and place in the world,"

I said, laying my hand on his arm. "The name and the place of a servant of G.o.d. Won't you, Hugh? Then you will come to true joy, and honour - the joy and honour that G.o.d gives. Let me have the joy of knowing that! I have done so much mischief, - let me know that the mischief is mended."

"What mischief have you done?" he asked, with his voice roughened by feeling.

"I did not know what I was leading you - and others - into."

"You led to nothing; except as the breath of a rose leads one to stretch out one's hand for it," he answered. "The rose has as much design!"

He turned aside hastily, stooped for a little twig that lay on the roadside, and began a.s.siduously breaking it up. And the silence was not interrupted again, till we came in sight of our friends in advance of us, leisurely walking to let us come up. Then Hugh and I plunged into conversation; but what it was about I have not the least remembrance. It lasted though, till we joined company with the rest of our party, and the talk became general. Still I do not know what we talked about. I had a feeling of thunder in the air, though the very stillness of sunlight beauty was on the smooth water and the hilly sh.o.r.e; and I saw clouds rising and gathering, even though Mont Blanc as we returned that evening showed rosy hues to its very summit in the clear heaven. I can hardly tell how, my mother's manner or something in it, made me sure both of the clouds and the thunder. It was full of grace, tact and spirit, to such a point of admiration. Yet I read in it, yes, and in that very grace and spirit, a certain state of the nervous powers which told of excitement at work, or a fund of determination gathering; the electric forces ma.s.sing somewhere; and this luminous play only foretold the lightning.

CHAPTER XIII.